2010-12-13

This story came through on slashdot on the weekend, stating that Gawker had been compromised. Gizmodo and LifeHacker are among the compromised password sets (as are Kotaku and io9):

'Our user databases do indeed appear to have been compromised. The passwords were encrypted. But simple ones may be vulnerable to a brute-force attack. You should change the password on Gawker (GED/commenting system) and on any other sites on which you've used the same passwords. Out of an abundance of caution, you should also change your company email password and any passwords that may have appeared in your email messages. We're deeply embarrassed by this breach. We should not be in the position of relying on the goodwill of the hackers who identified the weakness in our systems.'

If you don't understand this story, perhaps it doesn't apply to you. So don't worry about it. I know of at least one reader who does use these services.

2010-12-08

I have been trying Chrome out for a few months now but ultimately, I'm walking away because it lacks a simple feature that I find needful while others (the seriously visually impaired) find it absolutely crucial. I can't over-ride page fonts with user fonts in Chrome.

Somebody please let me know what setting I've missed if it's already there. Somebody please let me know, too, if a new version of Chrome includes this feature.

Despite the potential for search-traffic analysis and Chrome sending my address-bar contents to Google after every character, there were lots of things to like about Chrome and I could be tempted to come back. It seems all browsers are doing that now anyways, with no option of turning it off. My objections are purist, possibly to the point of Luddism: it's a text-entry field, for pity's sakes! Kindly wait until I hit return before sending it anywhere.

2010-12-07

With the purchase of Novell by the Microsoft-backed Attachmate, it is imperative that users of -- especially large users of, as well as users of large numbers of systems running -- Linux consider the final dispostion of 882 patents formerly held by Novell, and considered by some to be covering elements of Linux.

I point to this article from groklaw, and encourage you to consider the deadline imposed by the finality of the sale. Members of the Open Invention Network will be held to have a license for those patents by Novell at least until January 23 and in perpetuity after that for those who were members at that date.

So far as I can see, joining is as simple as subscribing to their newsletter, which you can do through their "Contact Us" web form. If this is not enough, then as soon as I find that out, I will post a follow-up to these instructions at that time.

I will post an answer in two weeks or so. If you need help brute-forcing the headlines, try the applet at this location (thanks to The Phoenix Society for their link). If you need an introduction to solving headline puzzles, try this document (also from the Phoenix Society). Happy solving! Feel free to create your own headline puzzles and send them to me -- you can use my tool if you want.